Childhood
by Wolf.82
Summary: Just a story on Roy's past. If you haven't read the most recent chapter of the manga, this contains spoilers, also will probably contain spoilers from chapter 58. Royai,please R&R!
1. Chapter 1

If Roy was speaking honestly about his childhood, he would have said it didn't really begin until he was about 5. His parents had been killed by rogue soldiers who had fled the military. It wasn't until later that Roy had decided to join the military and stop any other child from going through that kind of loss. He had been taken in by Madame Christmas, better known as Chris Mustang. Though she smoked and owned the local bar, Roy thought she was a nice foster parent, she certainly taught him a lot about the corrupt world that surrounded him.

At the age of 15, he decided to leave home and study alchemy with an old man named Master Hawkeye. This of course meant leaving Madame Christmas, which he was reluctant to do. He told himself he was too old to cry, but couldn't help let just one tear fall as he hugged her and said goodbye. Chris just smiled and said "It's not goodbye Roy-boy, it's see you later"

As Roy made his way to the Hawkeye residence, he was wondering what kind of family the old guy had. Surely he wouldn't be living alone in that big old house, would he? In any case, Roy was here to learn alchemy, not the history of the family. He walked up the steps, grabbed hold of the eagle shaped door handle and knocked. '_Eagle door handles, How ironic'_ he thought to himself. While he was musing over the doors, a girl stepped out and watched him as he inspected the door. "Excuse me, would you happen to be Mr. Mustang?" She asked politely.

"Huh?" He asked, slightly taken aback at the fact there was a girl standing in front of him. "Umm, yeah that's me. Are you master Hawkeye's daughter by chance?"

"Yes, my name is Riza, nice to meet you." She said politely and bowed her head a bit.

"There's no need to be so formal miss… Riza was it? Sorry, my memory with names is terrible"

"Short term memory loss?" she asked.

"Nah... I just zone out a lot of the time." He said, scratching the back of his neck, a slightly embarrassed looking smile on his face.

"Well…I think father would like to see you, follow me." She said, and with that, she grabbed half of his luggage and disappeared into the mansion.

As Roy followed her, he was busy thinking about how pretty she was. She was also quite innocent but intelligent at the same time, unlike any of the other girls he had conversed with, she had brains. She really did destroy the theory of 'dumb-blondes'. While he was deep in thought, they had arrived at master Hawkeye's study. Riza knocked on the door and a rather weak sounding but not exactly deep voice called out. "Riza, bring our guest in will you?"

"He's with me father" she replied, and then opened the door to reveal a frail looking man sitting at a desk. He looked a bit like Riza, but not overly. He had the same hazel eyes and his blonde hair was only a few tones lighter than hers, probably due to age, but Roy couldn't tell. Aside from that, their facial features were quite different; Roy wondered whether Riza looked more like her mother.

"So, you came here to learn alchemy Roy?" he questioned, raising an eyebrow.

"That's correct" he replied.

"Just call me Master Hawkeye." He said politely. "Riza, would you show our guest to his room please?"

"Yes father" She replied, and with that, she turned on her heel down the hallway. Roy could hardly keep up with her without starting to jog.

"We're here Mr. Mustang" she told him.

"Like I said before, no need to be so formal. Just call me Roy, ok?" He asked.

"My father will be upset if I'm not respectful to you…"she said, a slight look of fear in her eyes.

"Ok, how about when he's not around then?" he asked.

"Um….ok Mr….. Roy." She said shyly, blushing slightly at calling him by his first name. This was the first student of her fathers who was so kind to her. He was quite handsome too, not that she should be thinking that. But there was something inside her that said they would become close friends during his stay here. She prayed it was right.

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A/N: Thanks to anyone who has been bothered to read this, reviews and opinions are needed so i know whether to continue it. Click the review button, i DARE you.


	2. Chapter 2

Roy awoke the next morning at the same time he usually woke up back home. But the thing was, Roy wasn't at home. Where was he? He started to panic but then memories of the day before came flooding back to him. 'How bad is my memory?' he thought to himself as he got up. He grabbed a towel that was hanging off the end of his bed and went to have a shower. When he was dressed and satisfied with his choice of clothing for the day, he made his way downstairs to the kitchen, by this time it was around 9am.

Roy was surprised to see that both Riza and Master Hawkeye were awake. Hawkeye sat at the table reading the daily news while Riza was busy preparing breakfast. Roy noticed Riza was having a bit of trouble with managing buttering toast and flipping pancakes, so he took the liberty of helping her. All she could muster was a slight blush and a quiet 'thank you'. When the two of them had successfully completed making breakfast, they all sat down around the table to eat and talk. Master Hawkeye was the first to make conversation. "So Roy, you are 15 now, are you not?" questioned Master Hawkeye.

"Yes, that's correct" he replied.

"Therefore you must attend school for another term, correct?" He quirked an eyebrow at Roy.

"Yes Master Hawkeye" He Replied.

"Hmm, do you think you could accompany Riza to her school and finish your learning there?" He questioned.

"Yes sir that would be fine." Roy answered politely.

"Alright, you have to be ready for tomorrow, both of you enjoy the time you have left of the holidays, and don't get up to any mischief, is that clear?" he asked seriously.

"Yes sir" they both answered at the same time, before proceeding to clean their plates and head back to their rooms. "Uh... Roy? Do you want to into town and have a look around, you just moved here so I thought maybe you'd like to explore a bit…"Riza asked shyly.

"Sure!" Said Roy enthusiastically, "That'd be great" he said with a smile before disappearing into his room. About 5 minutes later he emerged carrying a small backpack and a wallet. "Ready to go Riza?" he asked, still smiling.

"Sure, let's go." She replied with a sweet smile.

Despite the fact she had short hair, in Roy's eyes, Riza was the most beautiful girl he'd seen. She had everything he could want in a girl. She was pretty, intelligent, funny and quite cute. In his eyes, she was the closest thing there was to perfect. He noticed he was staring and Riza was giving him a strange look, one that asked politely what the hell you were doing. He quickly ceased and prompted them to keep walking. When they arrived in town, all Roy could do was stare around with a crazy looking smile on his face, this town may have been only a small country town, but it had everything a 15 year old could want. There was an old fashioned bakery, a blacksmith, a woodworker's store, a chemist, a few clothes shops here and there, some cafes and a huge lolly store. As Roy stared vacantly into the distance, Riza silently wondered how someone with such a poor memory and such a small attention span could possible hope to become a famous alchemist. "_Looks don't help people become famous scientists,_" she thought, "_But if they did then I'm sure Roy would be number one._" When Riza realized what she'd been thinking, she mentally slapped herself; there was no way they'd end up together, so thinking like that would only succeed in making her upset. "Riza?" Roy asked in a concerned voice. "Are you alright? You've been staring off for a while and you looked sad."

Riza was surprised at how concerned he sounded, it couldn't be right; she just decided to pass it off as friendly concern. Suddenly, Roy took her hand in his and began dragging her towards the lolly shop. "C'mon Riza! They have toffees!" he said excitedly. Riza just sighed and followed him.

Once Roy had succeeded in buying a few kilos of various lollies, they decided to go to the blacksmiths. As soon as they got inside, Roy's eyes lit up and he began frantically running around the store inspecting everything that looked even vaguely cool. He suddenly spotted a katana (Japanese samurai sword) and picked it up. It was a beautiful steel sword covered in hematite to give it a dark, silvery glow. It had a Chinese dragon along the edge and writing in Xingese saying "Flames of death" Roy knew how to read this because he was half Xingese, and though he hadn't been taught much because his parents had died, he studied it in his spare time. The dragon and the writing were gold, real gold, not just fake spray of some sort. The swords case was made of beautiful wood with bits of auburn and red in it, and in some places there was opal shining in the wood. "How much is this?" Roy asked.

"That's 500 sen son, I'm fairly sure that's out of your price range" the shopkeeper replied. Just then Roy heard a voice out the back of the shop that sounded somewhat familiar. "Grandma, give the guy a discount, I know him." Roy wracked his brain for who the voice might belong to, but no matter how hard he tried, it just didn't come to him.

"If you say so!" she said. "Alright, 350 and that's the best offer I'm giving you."

"Deal!" said Roy excitedly and handed over the money. Just then, a boy who looked to be around Roy's age stepped out from behind the register. "Long time no see eh Roy?"

A/N: ha-ha cliff-hanger, hopefully it'll get me some more reviews, because I don't like spending time writing if no-one acknowledges they've read it. Anyways, thanks to anyone who does review and I promise I'll update soon!


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: that cliffy was fun! It got me some reviews and lots of people putting my story on their alerts list! YAY! Well, the cliffhanger needs resolving, so onto the story!

"Long time no see, eh Roy?" asked the young man. He had spiky black hair, very deep green eyes, small amounts of stubble and rectangular spectacles hanging off the bridge of his nose. Roy was shocked. Maes had moved away from his their hometown when they were both only 5. They were both at the orphanage at the time; Maes wouldn't say anything much about his past. Just as they became best friends, the orphanage had found Maes' grandmother, and he was forced to move away. Roy couldn't express in words how happy he was to see the guy, his eyes lit up, threatening to let tears fall as he threw himself at Maes, pulling him into a bear hug. "MAES!" he yelled, "I can't believe it, your really here."

"Mmph, Roy stop it you're choking me!" he yelled while laughing. After they had both taken a step back, they looked one another in the eye and both genuinely smiled at one another. "Sorry I didn't write Roy, I sent a bunch of thing to the orphanage, they wrote back saying you'd left, they didn't know where you were."

"I'm just glad to see you Maes, I'm glad you're ok" He said sincerely, wiping a small tear from the edge of his eye. Then he remembered Riza was with him, and decided to introduce her. "Umm, Maes I don't know if you two are acquainted yet, but this is Riza Hawkeye, the daughter of my alchemy teacher, master Hawkeye."

"Well, I only moved here with grandma last week, guess we were just meant to stick together, eh?" asked Maes with a cheeky grin on his face.

"That's how it goes" replied Roy, smiling happily.

"and hello miss Riza, it's nice to meet you." said Maes, extending his hand to shake hers. There were a number of reasons why he didn't kiss it. Probably the main one was he had never seen Roy look at a girl that way, in a way that made it look like he truly cared what happened to them. And of course his other slightly more selfish reason was because he liked someone.

"You too …Mr?" Riza questioned.

"It's Hughes, but just call me Maes, Kay?" he asked.

"Sure!" she replied happily.

After an emotional reunion with Maes, Roy and Riza returned home. It was a beautiful walk, it was twilight and there were massive fields in every direction, most with a creek ruunning through them. There were fireflies floating above the water and around the reeds and violet colored flowers with yellow centers that seemed to glow in the dusk light, it truly was amazing. "I'm glad we ran into Maes, you two seemed really happy Roy" Riza said, her facing glowing in the light of two fireflies.

"It was wonderful. I can see the three of us becoming a close group, haha, maybe school will be fun now!" he laughed happily. Riza watched him Roy. She couldn't understand why, but seeing this boy happy meant the world to her, his emotions affected hers in a way that she would feel how he did. It was strange, but Riza didn't mind at all, she was glad to have someone to relate to. And hearing him say they would become a close group, it made her want to laugh with him and run around like there was no tommorow. She finally felt as if she had a good group of close friends who she'd never lose.

Whe they arrived home, it was nearing 8.00pm, Riza's father had left a note telling them there was a few things in the cupboard they could have for dinner, and that he had gone to bed early as he wasn't feeling well. Roy and Riza got some items of food out of the cupboard and made french toast. Once they had both finished, they sat at the table in an awkward silence. " Do you have a chess set Riza?" asked Roy, breaking the silence.

"Um, My father has a marble one in the lounge room, but I don't know what condition it's in, I haven't seen it in years.." She replied.

"We'll just have to find out won't we?" He said smirking, before disappearing into the lounge room.

Riza followed and Roy lit the fire while Riza found the chess set. She pulled it out of the cupboard and blew the dust that had settled on the top of the box. One the dust had cleared she read what was inscribd on the top of the box. It read "_Hawkeye". _Riza opened it cautiously, and found that the set was intyact and in almost mint condition. "_Shame about the box_" she thought to herself as she set it up on the table. The game went on for a good 2 hours, by which time it was around 11pm. Roy and Riza quickly packed up the chess set and ran up the stairs together. They reached Roy's door and there was a silence. "um...good night Roy" said Riza politely.

"Good night Riza"said Roy, before leaning over to Riza and kissing her gently on the cheek. Before Riza could react, Roy was gone, dissapeared into his room. All Riza could do was stand there resting her hand on the spot where he had kissed her. She thought about what he had said earlier, about becoming close friends. Her heart sank. It was a friendly action, nothing more, nothing less. Yet as she found her way to her room, she had an increasing sense of doubt that it was a friendly action at all. Maybe she was just thinking of it as what she wanted it to be, but she couldn't help but think that maybe he felt the same way. Though Riza would never admit it, not to Roy and **definitely** not to herself, she was in love with him. She had been since the second she'd laid eyes on him.

A/N: sorry this took so long to update, Microsoft word was being a bitch and i had homework. hope you enjoyed it! and im pretty sure it'l be updated by the end of next week. of course that all depends wether or not you review!


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